“1st Company is moving in!”
“Have we figured out what happened?!”
“We've lost contact with the 3rd Platoon that entered first!”
“Damn it...!”
The sudden explosion did not throw only the cadets inside the training ground into confusion.
Two companies of the 23rd Security Brigade, stationed nearby and responsible for the security of the Central Special-duty Officer Academy, immediately sensed that something was terribly wrong and advanced into the training ground.
“Everyone, move in.”
Although none of them were superhumans, every soldier was equipped with Grade-A Reinforced Exoskeletons, with three Titans leading the charge.
Rumble!
The Titans smashed through the collapsed wall of the training ground and rapidly entered the interior.
What greeted them was an utterly unbelievable scene.
“T-This is insane.”
“...They died instantly.”
Chunks of flesh dressed in cadet uniforms lay strewn across the floor.
Those whose hearts or brains had been pierced to death were tragic enough.
The truly horrifying sight was the corpse of a cadet whose entire body had been shredded apart by tentacles flying in from every direction, leaving not even a complete form behind.
No.
Could that even be called a corpse?
By sheer misfortune, they had been standing at the point where every nearby tentacle intersected, leaving behind nothing more than the pitiful remains of a cadet butchered like an animal.
“Urgh...!”
It was a scene horrific enough to trigger PTSD even in soldiers who had experienced the battlefield.
Yet what shocked them even more was the figure perched atop the massive dome of the Central Training Ground, something impossible to identify as either monster or machine.
“...What is that?”
“Th-That's a Creature!”
On the ceiling of the dome-shaped Central Training Ground.
Between the Bishop's exoskeleton, crimson Nano Machines that looked as though they had been infected continued multiplying, spawning tentacles without end.
Using those tentacles as supports driven into the ceiling, the Bishop floated in midair.
How could one even describe such a sight?
“...A spiderweb.”
At the muttering of one soldier staring blankly upward, everyone silently agreed.
It felt as though a true predator was lurking upon a densely woven spiderweb, its sinister glowing eyes fixed upon its prey with pure malice.
Their astonishment, however, did not last long.
Or rather, it would be more accurate to say that their instincts as soldiers overcame their fear.
“First Platoon, get the wounded and the researchers out first! Second Platoon and the Titans, prepare for possible engagement!”
“Yes, sir!”
At the order, First Platoon immediately escorted the injured cadets and the terrified researchers huddled behind Ginnatio out of the training ground.
“N-No. We have to stop it...!”
“The monitors are dead! Come with us!”
Naomi and several others remained behind, desperately pounding at the keyboards in an attempt to stop the rampaging Bishop.
Before long, however, they realized that an unknown lock had been placed on the system.
Left with no other choice, they were dragged outside.
The real problem, however, was the cadets.
“A... ah...”
The blood-soaked cadets trembling in terror were not difficult to deal with.
They simply had to be dragged outside by force.
The real issue was the cadets driven mad by vengeance.
“I'll kill it!”
“You filthy fucking beast!”
In most cases, someone close to them—or someone even more precious—had been wounded or killed.
Ignoring the soldiers trying to stop them, they charged or leaped toward the Bishop.
Yet most of them could not even reach it, struggling merely to fend off the incoming tentacles.
“W-What do we do?”
The soldiers of the 23rd Security Brigade were just as flustered.
As their navy-blue uniforms made obvious, they were fundamentally ordinary people, and most of their weapons had been designed for combat against Special-duty Officers.
Naturally.
It was called the Security Brigade.
Their primary mission was maintaining order within the Central Special-duty Officer Academy and responding to terrorism or sabotage.
There had never been combat regulations for fighting beasts.
Even so, standing by and doing nothing was not an option.
“Open fire!”
Deciding that immediate attack mattered more than hesitation, the company commander's order rang out.
The Titans' machine guns roared to life.
At the same time, the infantry raised their SSRs (Soldier Small Rail Guns), the standard infantry rail guns, unleashing a barrage toward the Bishop.
“Stop! Damn it...!”
As Baek Hwi-young's desperate shout suggested, however, their choice produced disastrous results.
-Uuuuu....
Already driven into an even greater frenzy after being struck by Baek Hwi-young's spear, the Bishop instantly turned its gaze toward the soldiers.
Dozens of tentacles created by the crimson Nano Machines shot toward them at unbelievable speed.
Kwadududududeuk!
The tremendous impact slammed into Ginnatio's Refraction barrier, knocking the breath from his lungs.
Finally exhaling the breath he had been holding, he could only press his trembling fingertips against the ground.
“N-No.”
Maintaining a defensive barrier covering a training ground the size of a soccer field while blocking dozens of scattered attacks, each carrying concentrated destructive force...
Even for Assistant Instructor Ginnatio, it had become impossible.
“Get out of the way...! Cough!”
The instant the words left his mouth, a crushing impact struck his heart.
Blood burst from his lips as his legs gave out beneath him.
Then, lifting his head with great effort, he bit down hard on his lip at the sight before him.
‘Too late.’
The incoming tentacles pierced straight through the specially treated Carbene Alloy armor plating of the lead Titan before blowing it apart.
Nor did it end there.
The necks and heads of the soldiers firing their rail guns behind it exploded in an instant.
Their flesh was torn apart as though struck by giant whips before erupting into the air like fireworks.
Death spread across the battlefield in an instant.
The sight overlapped perfectly with what he had witnessed at Mercato.
Overcome by a surge of nausea, Ginnatio found himself unconsciously murmuring one man's name.
“Jin Crow... Cough!”
It was a whisper born purely from instinct.
It was then.
Behind the collapsed wall of the training ground, Miel, who had been moving the cadets and treating the wounded, spotted Ginnatio.
As though making up her mind, she rushed toward him.
“Assistant Instructor!”
Her small shoulders trembled violently.
Her light brown eyes shook just as badly.
Even so, she never slowed.
If anything, she reached the collapsed Ginnatio faster than ever before and immediately examined him.
‘It's only exhaustion, but he consumed that much Psionic Energy.’
Her examination revealed no obvious internal or external injuries.
Relief had only just begun to wash over her.
“Huh?”
A chilling sensation ran down her spine, causing her to instinctively look up.
Just as expected.
Her vision was instantly filled with tentacles.
Reflexively shutting her eyes, Miel screamed.
“Kya, KYAAAAAAH!”
“Miel!”
From the distance, Baek Hwi-young, who had been about to throw another spear at the Bishop, finally noticed her and immediately threw himself forward.
The Bishop, however, allowed him no such opportunity.
Kwaagwagwagwang!
A tentacle slammed down vertically, cutting off his path.
Even as he felt the muscles in his forearm tearing apart, Baek Hwi-young gritted his teeth, severed the tentacle, and desperately reached forward.
“AAAAAAAAAH!”
The tentacle blocking his vision overlapped with the one thrusting toward her.
He did not need a minute.
Just thirty seconds.
Thirty seconds would have been enough to reach her.
Yet that fleeting gap seemed destined to steal her away forever.
The moment he saw the terror lingering in her brown eyes, Baek Hwi-young's mind turned completely white.
It was not merely the fear of the present.
Perhaps...
It was the moment that laid bare the feelings for Miel he had desperately tried to suppress.
-I love you, Hwi-young.
The shy face whispering softly.
-...Y-You're a monster.
The face trembling in fear as she backed away.
-Were we doomed to perish from the very beginning, Hwi-young?
The face asking in utter despair.
-Please.
Don't forget me.
The face whispering like a plea.
-I hate you.
The face sneering with terrifying hatred and rage.
-Tell me you love me.
And finally...
The face whispering through tears.
The Miel he had lost in the previous regression overlapped with the Miel standing before him now.
An endless succession of losses.
The thought that an ending even more futile than before was about to repeat itself triggered Baek Hwi-young's trauma.
Just as his eyes were about to become consumed by killing intent and self-loathing—
“...How fucking disgusting.”
Miel trembling with her eyes tightly shut.
Baek Hwi-young desperately reaching out through his crumbling sanity.
Ginnatio struggling to move his rigid body as he barely caught his breath.
Into their ears drifted the all-too-familiar voice of one man, filled with irritation and contempt.
“You filthy fucking vermin.”
KWAAAAAAAAAAAAANG!
A flash exploded before Miel.
The tentacles aiming for her were severed all at once.
Crunch.
The sound of grinding teeth shattered the silence, echoing throughout the training ground with terrifying clarity.
“...Ah.”
The overwhelming fear that had seemed ready to pierce her throat vanished.
Opening her eyes, Miel looked up at the broad black back standing before her.
She collapsed to the ground and burst into tears.
“I-Instructooor...”
Jin Crow tightened his grip around the sword in his hand.
Then, irritably pulling the hip flask from his coat, he drained every last drop of liquor before roaring with a fury no one had ever heard from him before.
“Ideale!”
It was a roar utterly devoid of courtesy or restraint.
Kwadudududeuk!
At his shout, white ice crystals spread through the cracks in the shattered dome.
Piercing through them, Ideale descended into the training ground.
Her white hair fluttered in the air as her eyes blazed with killing intent and fury.
“I know.”
Her anger was far quieter and calmer than Jin Crow's.
Kagagagagagang!
Yet paradoxically, the storm of blades rushing toward the Bishop mercilessly shattered every single one of its tentacles in an instant.
-UUUUUU!
Instinctive fear finally gripping it, the Bishop desperately tried to flee outside the dome.
Ideale did not permit even that.
“Freeze.”
「Absolute Zero」
The frozen world that had mercilessly slaughtered the Queen and King at Mercato unfolded once again.
Its body froze solid in an instant before crashing pitifully beneath the dome as though falling into a bottomless abyss.
“It reminds me once again.”
Waiting beneath it...
Was Jin Crow, his bloodshot eyes fixed upward, his lips bitten so hard that blood seeped from them.
“...In this galaxy.
No.
In this world.”
His expression had already gone beyond rage into outright scorn.
With a single flash, he cleaved the Bishop's body apart and added,
“There are far too many fucking sons of bitches.”
The reinforcement company that arrived moments later, along with the Military Police led by Obia Timist, saw only one thing.
Slice.
Thud.
The grotesque halves of the Bishop rolling pitifully across the ground.
And standing among them...
Jin Crow.
His hand gripping his sword trembled violently, his face twisted with emptiness and rage.
“...Far too many.”
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